Abbey's Road: Abbey Leonardi's Unconventional Route to the Top

For a 5-foot-1 16-year-old who's barely audible, Leonardi can turn a lot of heads

For a 5-foot-1 16-year-old who's usually barely audible, Abbey Leonardi can turn a lot of heads.

"We went out for a run one day when she was 8 or 9 years old," her father, Jack, says about her first run. "My wife, myself, Abbey and her twin sister. We just kind of said, 'You guys wanna go?' I was running in the back and as we were running she was just so smooth and quiet. Her natural gait was just incredible, no effort to it. You could barely hear her feet touch the ground. When we got done I said to my wife, 'Wow.'"

Fast-forward to Leonardi's freshman year. Kristin Barry, a 2:40 marathoner, came to a high school meet to watch her compete. "I remember seeing her do drills while she was warming up," Barry says, "and I thought, 'Wow, she really knows what she's doing.' She just looked so much different than most of the teens you see at a meet."

Leonardi caused even more people to say "wow" last spring, when, as a sophomore, she won the Maine state 1600m and 3200m titles in 4:51 and 10:42, both state records. A week later, she won the New England 3200m title in 10:26, defeating all available juniors and seniors from Maine and five other states. She closed her sophomore year by taking fourth in the 2-mile at New Balance Nationals, also in 10:26 (and therefore superior to her New England 3200m time).

She's achieved all this while being in, but not of, her team at Kennebunk High School. "She's got a cross country coach and a track coach, but they have always allowed me to kind of, I won't say dictate, but guide how she's training," says Jack, a CFO of a security company who out of necessity has become a running autodidact. Leonardi's most frequent workout partner is Barry, who graduated from high school two years before Leonardi was born. Her mileage is modest ("I think the most I did in a week was 45," she says), the approach intentionally conservative. "We want to focus on not doing too much too soon in case I get burned out or don't like it or whatever," Leonardi says. Barry consults with Jack on the training to imprint on Leonardi's typical 35-mile week the guiding principles of Barry's 120-mile weeks. Meanwhile, Leonardi bikes and swims and works at a lemonade stand and otherwise tries to have a normal life.

Can this tattersall team get Leonardi on the podium at Foot Locker cross country nationals this fall?